Developing Country Interests in Agricultural Trade Reform

This paper examines whether developing countries, as a group, would be better off in the absence of agricultural protection in the industrial North and, if so, whether they should support reforms negotiated between the major players in the Uruguay Round. Results from the Tyers‐Anderson GLS model of world food markets suggest that the net effect of industrial country agricultural protection is beneficial to developing countries, though by only a small margin, even if its removal were to stimulate accelerated technical change in developing countries. The same is found to be true of partial reforms which are more palatable politically, such as quotas to reduce oversupply in the EC. Of course, many developing countries, including those which are members of the Cairns Group, are badly hurt by protection in the North. Unfortunately, however, they and the other members of that group stand to gain comparatively little from the reduction of oversupply in the EC through quotas.